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Foothills Trail

The Foothills trail connects downtown Boulder with the Boulder Valley Ranch to the north of town. If you are here and want to get there or there and want to get here, this is probably one of the best trails to be helping you out with your plan. No, it's not Mr. Toad's Wild Ride. It's not really even Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. This trail is more like a trek through a nature documentary (no, not the one with the lemmings), but it's a beautiful ride with great nature experiences on the edge of the foothills.

Is your work stress getting you down? Try commuting on this trail to set your mind at ease before another hard day! We at BMA have a dream that someday this trail will extend along the entire length of Boulder allowing people of the town to connect to singletrack both north and south as well as maybe ride to a romantic dinner downtown through open space!

This path varies between a wide crushed gravel surface to paved sidewalk-y kind of stuff. The very northern section is a degraded and eroded area of singletrack with some rocks and some wooden steps (don't worry, you'll see it coming). Other than that, this is pretty much smooth sailing.

As you ride, bear in mind that this ain't a racetrack. People are hiking, walking dogs -- heck, I've even seen someone walking their pet cat on this trail! It's wide and there's room to pass, but let's keep the mood good here amongst all users. We are really hoping to get a trail like this in the southern part of the City's open space and demonstrating how well people can get along and how valuable this is as a means of getting around is our key.

From Downtown: Technically, this trail begins at 4th and Kalmia near downtown, but 4th St. is a great bikeway all the way to Pearl St. Head north from the beginning of the path towards Wonderland Lake. There are several paths that meander through here, but as a general rule, if you head left at intersections, you'd be going the more direct route. There are many ways in and out of this path that connect to parts of North Boulder. Take a look at the Google maps bike routes of Boulder map for ideas on how to get to all kinds of places in the north part of town.

In North Boulder: This trail ends after crossing under Hwy 36 into North Broadway St. At this point, Broadway is dirt. If you progress north on Broadway, it dead ends into the Eagle Trail and you are golden for a fun ride in Boulder Valley Ranch! If you live in North Boulder, the easiest places to get on this trail are at Lee Hill Rd (about 1/4 mile west of Broadway - not the dirt Broadway, but the paved one you're probably familiar with) or at the Wonderland Lake parking area at Sumac Ave.